Tag Archives: Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani

by Steven Emerson, John Rossomando and Dave YonkmanIPT News
October 31, 2014

Since the beginning of Brookings’ relationship with Qatar in 2002, its scholars have increasingly advocated that U.S. policymakers open a direct channel to Hamas – a position in keeping with Qatar’s foreign policy.

Qatar pledged $50 million to support Hamas in 2006, and the former emir pledged another $400 million to Hamas’ cash-strapped government in Gaza during an October 2012 state visit. Its funding of Hamas continues despite the accession of Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani to the Qatari throne following his father’s abdication last year. Current Prime Minister Abdullah bin Naser bin Khalifa Al Thani announced in June that Qatar would give Hamas $60 million to pay salaries of the terror group’s public servants. Earlier this month, Qatar pledged $1 billion to help rebuild Gaza after Hamas provoked a war with Israel by firing rockets at civilian communities. No strings were attached to the pledge.

Hamas political chief Khaled Meshaal lived in Qatar from 1999 until 2001 following his expulsion from Jordan. Meshaal told Al-Hayat in 2003 that Al Thani assisted his 1999 entry into Qatar and that he had maintained a “personal relationship” with the then-Qatari foreign minister.

Israel’s United Nations Ambassador Ron Prosor pointed his finger at Qatar in anAugust New York Times op-ed, blaming the Gulf state for every rocket and tunnel aimed at Israel, saying they were “made possible through a kind donation from the emir of Qatar.” Prosor described Qatar as a “Club Med for terrorists” for harboringMeshaal, influential Muslim Brotherhood cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi and Abdul Rahman Omeir al-Naimi, a Qatari history professor the U.S. Treasury Department designatedlast year as an al-Qaida financier.

Qatari technology allegedly helped Hamas build sophisticated cyber systems in tunnels and above ground to attack Israel. Nearly 70 percent of cyber-attacks against Israel during this summer’s Gaza war originated from Qatari-associated IP addresses. Sensors provided by the Gulf state in Hamas tunnels alerted the terrorists to approaching Israeli soldiers, and Qatari cloud-based software enabled Hamas to remotely fire its rockets, the Times of Israel reported.

Brookings portrays Qatar’s relations with Hamas in a positive light, setting the country up as a mediator between the terrorist group and Israel.

Barakat suggested that “Western powers might find themselves having to look for help from a different partner: Qatar,” Barakat wrote, giving a nod to the BDC’s sponsoring country. “Under President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Egypt has proven more adept at securing the backing of politicians and diplomats in Tel Aviv, Washington and New York for a peace initiative than it has at reaching out to Palestinians.”

Despite Barakat’s concerns, Egypt ultimately brokered the August agreement that ended the latest round of Hamas’ fighting with Israel.

Reports in the Arabic press indicate that Qatar had threatened to expel Meshaal from the country if he agreed to Egypt’s cease-fire terms in July.

Spreading disinformation about Hamas

Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr’s sentiments can also be found in the body of work of numerous Brookings scholars who argue that Hamas is willing to disarm or recognize Israel’s right to exist.

Numerous articles lend Brookings’ credibility to the false notion that Hamas’s 1988 charter calling for Palestinian Muslims to fight Israel “until liberation is achieved” no longer has relevance or to the notion that Hamas wants peaceful coexistence with Israel. Consequently, they argue that the U.S. should talk directly with Hamas.

Ms. Malika Bilal and Ms. Femi Oke

Al Jazeera English

PO Box 23127

Doha – Qatar

Dear Ms. Bilal and Ms. Femi Oke:

This letter is being sent to you on behalf of the Qatar Awareness Campaign Coalition. The purpose is to inform you and the public of the activities of Qatar, the country which owns Al Jazeera, the network on which you are co-hosts of the program, The Stream.

We urge to you read the information below, which includes evidence that Qatar is arguably the preeminent sponsor of terror in the world today. It is a benefactor of the genocidal armies of ISIS, al Qaeda, and Boko Haram; it is involved in Taliban narcotics trafficking through a relationship with the Pakistani National Logistics Cell; and profits from operating a virtual slave state. Qatar is involved in terror operations from Nigeria to Gaza to Syria to Iraq.

So the public understands why this letter is addressed to you both, who are American citizens and co-hosts of an Al Jazeera daily program, here is pertinent background on the Doha-based network.

In 1996, then Emir of Qatar, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, provided a $137 million loan to start Al Jazeera. Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani was the ruling monarch of Qatar from 1995-2013.

Al Jazeera is based out of Doha, the capital of Qatar.

In July 2013, 22 employees of Al Jazeera resigned after the station “air[ed] lies and misle[d] viewers” (according to Al Jazeera correspondent) regarding the Egyptian revolution on July 4, which ousted Muslim Brotherhood president Mohamed Morsi.

Al Jazeera is home to the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader (and Morsi-backer) Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who reaches an estimated 80 million viewers each week.

In light of Al Jazeera’s consistent and vocal support for the Muslim Brotherhood and their associated terror campaigns, we ask that you consider the attached sourced report on Qatar’s activities. Thelinks cited are vetted and credible sources. We hope you take the time to verify the truth of the statements for yourself.

After doing so, the Coalition of the Qatar Awareness Campaign calls on you to exert due influence on the Qatari government to cease any type of involvement in all forms of Islamic terrorism, slavery, and drug trafficking!

** Select signatures as of 9/27. The Qatar Awareness Campaign Coalition is comprised of more than 25 journalists, national security experts, publishers, and independent researchers. To view all Coalition participants, please visit the Campaign’s website.

Haifa, Israel –With seemingly limitless wealth and a penchant for often supporting both sides of the argument, the State of Qatar has become a highly significant player in Middle East power-politics. Recent events in Egypt and Syria, however, have put the brakes on Qatar’s ambitions. In this second part of his analysis of its attempt to influence regional politics, Paul Alster considers how much its flamboyant foreign policy, centered on furthering the interests of the Muslim Brotherhood, might be coming back to haunt Qatar.

July 3 was not a good day for Mohammed Morsi. The Muslim Brotherhood’s man was ousted from power after just a year as Egypt’s president, having lost the essential confidence of the country’s powerful military leaders. July 3 was also a black day for the State of Qatar, the country which had nailed its colors and its money firmly to the Muslim Brotherhood mast, and which suddenly found itself the target of outrage on the Egyptian street and beyond.

Morsi came to power in a democratic election, but misinterpreted the meaning of democracy. He and his Muslim Brotherhood backers – primarily Qatar – appeared to believe that having won the election, they could run the country according to their decree, not according to democratic principles as the majority had expected. A series of draconian laws, a spiralling economic crisis, and a feeling on the Egyptian street that the Muslim Brotherhood was paid handsomely by foreign forces, spurred street protests of historic proportions, prompting the military to intervene.

With Morsi gone, Qatar suddenly became “persona non grata” in Egypt.

Qatar sought to extend its influence and Muslim Brotherhood-inspired view of how countries like Egypt, Syria, Libya, and others should be. Qatar was also playing a power-game against Saudi Arabia, another hugely wealthy regional power whose vision of an even more strictly Islamist way of life for Muslims drove a wedge between the two parties.

Another seismic change hit the region just nine days before Morsi’s fall. The Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani – in power since overthrowing his own father back in 1995 – voluntarily abdicated in favor of his 33-year-old son, Sheikh Tamim.

Tamim, educated in England and a graduate of the prestigious Sandhurst Military Academy, became the region’s youngest leader, with the eyes of the world watching to see if he would maintain his father’s aggressive policy of extending Qatar’s regional influence. Few could have imagined that he would very quickly find himself at the center of a major political crisis as Egypt – a country in which Qatar had so much credibility and money invested – imploded before his eyes.

Within hours of Morsi’s departure, the streets of Cairo were awash with anti-Qatari banners accompanied by the obligatory anti-US and anti-Israel slogans. Al Jazeera – a staunch promoter of the Muslim Brotherhood view in Egypt – was vilified, its reporters attacked on the streets, its offices ransacked. Al Jazeera also had been hit seven months earlier after supporting Mohammed Morsi’s crackdown on young Egyptian demonstrators opposed to the rapid Islamisation of Egypt under the new government.

The tiny Persian Gulf sheikhdom of Qatar exerts an international influence in financial, military, political and theological affairs that’s way out of proportion to its diminutive physical presence as a peninsular appendage of Saudi Arabia’s eastern coast. Thanks to its enormous wealth, courtesy of abundant oil and natural gas reserves, Qatar has been flexing its muscles both regionally and well beyond.

Independent since 1971, this former British protectorate that is led by Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, a Sandhurst Military Academy graduate, not only has been on a major spending spree, snapping up prime properties from London to China, but is also reportedly bankrolling the global jihad movement.

Home away from home since 1961 for the Muslim Brotherhood’s senior jurist, the Egyptian Yousef al-Qaradawi, Qatar is the headquarters of Al-Jazeera television. Al-Jazeera is owned by the Qatar Media Corporation and is the broadcast outlet of choice for jihadist groups from Al-Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah to the Muslim Brotherhood. Seeking access to the U.S. market for a while, Al-Jazeera just got its foot in the door to propagate its anti-American, antisemitic, terror and violence agenda with the acquisition of former Vice President Al Gore’s Current TV network this January.

During his long exile in Qatar, al-Qaradawi developed a massive following across the Muslim world through use of the internet and TV. His hugely popular TV program, “Life and Islamic Law,” which airs weekly on Al-Jazeera, is viewed by tens of millions of Muslims.

Inaugurated just in time to begin providing guidance on Islamic legislation for all the new Ikhwan-dominated regimes now consolidating power across the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region, CILE aims to ensure that 21st century realities remain firmly aligned with core Islamic teaching.

There should be no lack of practical applications to occupy Ramadan and the CILE staff, as Qatar reportedly has been backing its ideological convictions with money — lots of money.

According to the New York Times, the Obama administration first gave its approval in early 2011 for Qatar to send weapons shipments to Libyan rebels fighting to oust Muammar Qaddafi, who had been working to suppress Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood. Once the U.S. government reversed its policy in order to support the jihadist rebels whose ranks were dominated by Al-Qaeda, it was Qatari money and Qatari weapons that put them on the road to victory. U.S. and NATO support, coordinated out of Benghazi, Libya by Christopher Stevens, the U.S. designated liaison to the Al-Qaeda militias, ensured the subsequent expansion of Al-Qaeda beyond Libya and across the Islamic Maghreb as well as West Africa.

Reports in the French media in mid-2012 accused Qatar of providing unspecified amounts of weapons and funding in dollars to Al-Qaeda-linked militias across North and West Africa, including Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the Movement for Tawhid and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO, in French) and Ansar al-Dine.

Apparently betting on the continued rise of Islamic influence across the region, Qatar is parlaying its Islamic credentials for both business and jihadist objectives. According to the respected French weekly Le Canard Enchainé, Qatar is well-entrenched in the region — but especially in Mali — and has been operating under cover of a network of humanitarian NGOs it has established there such as the Qatari Red Crescent, madrassas and other charities.

Muslim immigrants and their supporters have been using a combination of lawsuits, verbal and physical harassment — and even murder — to silence debate about the rise of Islam.

Opinion surveys show that to voters in France — home to an estimated 6.5 million Muslims, the largest Muslim population in the European Union — Islam and the question of Muslim immigration have emerged in 2012 as a top-ranked public concern. The French, it seems, are increasingly worried about the establishment of a parallel Muslim society there.

But government efforts this year to push back against the Islamization of France were halting and half-hearted and could be described as “one step forward, two steps back.”

A chronological review of some of the main stories involving the rise of Islam in France during 2012 includes:

Muslim immigrants, as of January, began to find it more difficult to obtain French citizenship. New citizenship rules that entered into effect on January 1, 2012 now require all applicants to pass exams on French culture and history and also to prove that their French language skills are equivalent to those of a 15-year-old native speaker. Moreover, candidates seeking French citizenship will be required to pledge allegiance to “French values.”

Muslim applicants make up the majority of the 100,000 people naturalized as French citizens each year, and the new citizenship requirements form part of a larger effort to promote Muslim integration into French society.

In February, the Persian Gulf Emirate of Qatar announced plans to invest €50 million ($65 million) in French suburbs, home to more than one million disgruntled Muslim immigrants.

Qatar said its investment was intended to support small businesses in disadvantaged Muslim neighborhoods. But as Qatar, like Saudi Arabia, subscribes to the ultra-conservative Wahhabi sect of Islam, critics say the emirate’s real objective is to peddle its religious ideology among Muslims in France and other parts of Europe.

Shortly before Qatar announced its plans to invest in France, Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, who has long cultivated an image as a pro-Western reformist and modernizer, vowed to “spare no effort” to spread the fundamentalist teachings of Wahhabi Islam across “the whole world.”

The promotion of Islamic extremist ideologies — particularly Wahhabism, which not only discourages Muslim integration in the West, but actively encourages jihad against non-Muslims — threatens to further radicalize Muslim immigrants in France.

The Qatari investments are being targeted in blighted French suburban slums, known in France as banlieues, where up to one million or more mostly unemployed Muslim immigrants from North Africa and the Middle East try to get by on an impoverished existence.

The banlieues are already being exploited by Islamist preachers from countries such as Morocco and Turkey which are leveraging the social marginalization of Muslim immigrants in France to create “separate Islamic societies” ruled by Islamic Sharia law.

Also in February, a French television documentary revealed that all of the slaughterhouses in the greater Paris metropolitan area are now producing all of their meat in accordance with Islamic Sharia law.

Read this carefully. It is a shocking and factual description of the situation at present, but it is also the prophecy of the future for Europe – or should we already call it Eurabia.

Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal maintains a residence in Qatar, while the Taliban opened their first representation in a foreign country in its capital, Doha.

A hateful wind emanating from the small Islamic emirate is now blowing toward Europe, a wind accompanied by an ocean of poisonous, oily, bloody money – all coming from the peninsula in the Persian Gulf which today is the world’s richest country.

Slowly, Qatar is buying Europe’s assets.

Qatar, not exactly or even the slightest bit French-speaking, has just joined the “International Organisation of la Francphonie” as an associate member. Qatar’s goal is clear: to change and manipulate French culture. For example, the Voltaire School in Doha banned a religious book that discussed Christianity in the Middle Ages.

Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, who has cultivated the image of a pro-Western reformist, vowed to “spare no effort” to spread the teachings of Wahhabi Islam across “the whole world”. Last December Qatari Emir inaugurated the “Imam Imam Muhammad Ibn Abdul Wahhab” Mosque in Doha, dedicated to the founder of the most virulent, anti-Jewish and totalitarian Islamic school of religion.

Qatar’s octopus is working on three fronts: overthrowing despotic Arab regimes and replace these with sharia-based countries; destroying Israel by financing the terror groups (the emir just visited Gaza) – and Islamizing the European continent through mosques and investments.

In Italy, to mention just one well known firm, Qatar just bought Valentino’s fashion style company, while AC-Milan owner Silvio Berlusconi is also ready to sell the powerhouse to the ruling Emir of the State of Qatar.

In the UK, the Qatar Muslims own swathes of the Canary Wharf financial district in London. Qatar also owns 20 per cent of the London Stock Exchange.

Qatar invested in the Paris St. Germain soccer club and it is an investor in the French Total Oil group, as well as British Shell.

Qatar financed the 95% of the Shard tower in London, the highest skyscraper in Europe.

In Cannes, the emir bought an hotel famous for hosting celebrities during the film festival, but it’s also looking to buy a Jewish symbol like the Les Trois Rois hotel in Basel, Switzerland, scene of the iconic portrait of Theodor Herzl.

Qatar has also purchased, for 300 million euros, the building which hosts part of the US Embassy in Paris.

Qatar announced last February, when Nicolas Sarkozy was still the President of France, that it was willing to spend $65 million in the French banlieues, the suburbs home to the vast majority of the six million Muslims in France. Then Qatar doubled the sum to €100 million, which the extreme leftist French newspaper Libération describes as a “Qatari take over of the banlieues.”

Another newspaper, Le Figaro, seeing the handwriting on the wall (writing a check?, published an article recently, titled: “Will France become an Islamic Republique?”.

Gas-rich Qatar may invest up to 10 billion euros in big French firms, the ambassador of the Gulf state in France, Mohamed Jaham Al-Kuwari, announced this week.

In Switzerland, where Qatar is economically very important, famous firms such as Swatch, Tissot and Victorinox, have removed the cross of the Swiss flag from many advertisements, especially in Arab and Asian countries. In many cases the cross on the red background, a sign of identity of the Swiss cantons, has been replaced by the words “Swiss Made”. The Victorinox, the famous manufacturer of knives, replaced the cross with the letter “V”. The Swatch justified the removal by saying that “Muslim countries are not allowed to show the cross in public.”

Qatar in Spain funnels its donations through the Islamic League for Dialogue and Coexistence , a group linked to the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria and which controls the Catalan Islamic Cultural Center. Qatar just paid $450,000 to renovate that center based in Barcelona.

In Italy, the Qatari emir is financing the construction of many mega mosques, while in Ireland Qatar recently donated €800,000 to build a mega-mosque in Cork.

Donations helped also to secure Qatar a seat in the Unesco’s World Heritage Committee, used by the Palestinians to advance their Jüdenrein agenda in Judea and Samaria.

Qatar also has an ambitious project to build a mega mosque and Islamic institute in Munich, Germany, which they say would “build a bridge between Islam and Europe”. Munich – where Pope Joseph Ratzinger was archbishop from 1977 to 1981 – is the city in which the Muslim Brotherhood has gained control of most of the mosques and of active Islam in Germany and in Europe.

The European Council for Fatwa and Research is headed by imam Yusuf al Qaradawi, based in Doha, Qatar.

Qatar is a bastion of anti-Semitism, which goes around the world along with the investments. A Qatari television show, based on a book by late Palestinian author Ghassan Kanafani, shows a Holocaust survivor who resorts to prostitution and claims the Nazis did no wrong. “I didn’t see any gas chambers”, she is seen saying. An actor depicting former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin calls on Jews to murder Arab civilians.

Giulio Meotti, an Italian journalist with Il Foglio, writes a twice-weekly column for Arutz Sheva. He is the author of the book “A New Shoah”, that researched the personal stories of Israel’s terror victims, published by Encounter. His writing has appeared in publications, such as the Wall Street Journal, Frontpage and Commentary. He is at work on a book about the Vatican and Israel.

Qatar’s Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani became the first head of state to visit Gaza since the Hamas terrorist organization seized control of the territory in June 2007, Ynetnews reported Tuesday. The visit was facilitated by Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood-led government, which issued a statement praising the move as part of its campaign “to break the siege on the people” of Gaza.

It marked a major reversal in Qatar’s relationship with Israel, which until January 2009 included clandestine talks and growing bilateral trade relations. The Qatari leader denounced Israel’s policies and praised the people of Gaza for standing up to the Jewish state with their “bare chests.” The Associated Press called it Hamas’ “biggest diplomatic victory since taking power five years ago.”

“It is the first visit by an Arab leader at this level to Gaza,” Hamas said in a statement. “This breaks the political isolation of the government and opens the door to break the siege.”

Despite vehement opposition from the Palestinian Authority and Israel, Sheik Khalifa also pledged $400 million for the beleaguered territory. Israel accused Qatar of taking sides against the Palestinian Authority government and claimed the decision was “hurting the Palestinians and the chance of pulling Gaza out of the mud and onto the road for peace.”

An aide to Palestinian President Abbas, Nimr Hamad, condemned Khalifa for giving “the impression that the visitors recognize their rule and that would reinforce the split [between Palestinian factions] and not help the reconciliation.”

Hamas has widely benefited from the creation of new Islamist regimes and the fall of Arab dictators. Islamist governments in Tunisia and Egypt have welcomed the Gazan terrorist group, despite attempts by the United States to crack down on its funding. Hamas has also profited from the flow of weapons out of Libya since Muammar Gaddafi’s fall.